Friday, July 10, 2015

Symptoms of a larger problem

Since
the start of Mr. Trump’s presidential campaign, a vexing question has
hovered over his candidacy: Why have so many party leaders — privately
appalled by Mr. Trump’s remarks about immigrants from Mexico — not
renounced him?

It
turns out, interviews show, that the mathematical delicacy of a
Republican victory in 2016 — and its dependence on aging, anxious white
voters — make it exceedingly perilous for the Republican Party to treat Mr. Trump as the pariah many of its leaders now wish he would become.

Not all Republicans are racist. It is not a "racist party" in the sense that the Dixiecrats were. But the modern Republican party depends on the racist vote. As long as they have to rely upon those voters to win elections, stuff that the party leadership and big money donors find embarrassing (like a last-ditch and hopeless sop to Confederate Flag supporters, and Trump's various verbal eruptions pushing him to the top of the polls) is going to continue to happen.